Food Stuffs: We Are What They Eat

You combine domestic lobbying juggernauts with the authority of international trade institutions and this is what you get.

Remember mystery meat, that allegedly food-like gray substance doled out by high-school lunch attendants and dormitory cafeteria express lines? (At my college, mystery meat was accompanied on the menu by its close relative, mystery fish, and a scrambled-egg delicacy we used to call The Speckled Death.) Anyway, thanks to your House of Representatives, as a nation, we are boldly stepping into a mystery meat world.

The House voted 300-131 to repeal labels that tell consumers what countries the meat is from — for example, "born in Canada, raised and slaughtered in the United States" or "born, raised and slaughtered in the United States." The WTO ruled against the labels last year. The Obama administration has already revised the labels once to try to comply with previous WTO rulings. Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack has said it's up to Congress to change the law to avoid retaliation from the two countries. The law was initially written at the behest of northern U.S. ranchers who compete with the Canadian cattle industry. It also was backed by consumer advocates who say it helps shoppers know where their food comes from. Supporters have called on the U.S. government to negotiate with Canada and Mexico to find labels acceptable to all countries. Rep. Marcy Kaptur, D-Ohio, said repeal would be premature, adding, "Our people deserve a right to know where their food is produced and where it comes from."

Advertisement - Continue Reading Below

During the debate, the indefatigable Rosa DeLauro of Connecticut made the quite salient point that, in his rush to pass the Trans-Pacific Partnership, the president repeatedly has emphasized that the terms of that agreement will not impinge on existing American law. DeLauro pointed out how that was happening with the country's Country of Origin labeling law, which went down yesterday. Last October, the World Trade Organization got the ball rolling by ruling against the United States at the behest of Canada and Mexico. The law no longer exists. These are not coincidental events. So, no, the WTO itself didn't repeal the law. It subcontracted the job out to one of its ancillary institutions, the United States Congress. Oh, brave new world, which has such nausea in it.

Meat processors who buy animals from abroad as well as many others in the U.S. meat industry have called for a repeal of the law they have fought for years, including unsuccessfully in federal court. They say it's burdensome and costly for producers and retailers. House Agriculture Committee Chairman Mike Conaway, R-Texas, has long backed the meat industry's call for repeal."Although some consumers desire (country-of-origin labeling) information, there is no evidence to conclude that this mandatory labeling translates into market-measurable increases in consumer demand for beef, pork or chicken," Conaway said on the House floor. House Speaker John Boehner, R-Ohio, said after the vote that the last thing American farmers need "is for Congress to sit idly by as international bureaucrats seek to punish them through retaliatory trade policies that could devastate agriculture as well as other industries." The bill would go beyond just the muscle cuts of red meat that were covered under the WTO case, repealing country-of-origin labeling for poultry, ground beef and ground pork. The chicken industry has said the labeling doesn't make much sense for poultry farmers because the majority of chicken consumed in the United States is hatched, raised and processed domestically.

A reporter from a Shanghai broadcaster secretly filmed inside the food processing plant of Shanghai Husi Food, a subsidiary of U.S.-based food supply giant OSI Group. The footage captured workers handling food with their bare hands. Several scenes showed them picking up meat that had fallen on the floor and returning it directly into the processing machine. One worker, his face concealed behind a surgical mask, turned to the camera and stated, "foul meat," referring to the meat being handled. Shanghai Municipal Food and Drug Administration (FDA) subsequently investigated the factory and found that expired beef and chicken products were processed and repackaged with new expiration dates. Amongst the tainted products, they were able to trace forged production dates on more than 4,300 cases of smoked beef patties, with more than 3,000 cases already sold.

Call me crazy, but I'd rather like to know whether my hamburger got dribbled off the floor of a Shanghai factory floor a few times before it got packaged up. You combine domestic lobbying juggernauts with the authority of international trade institutions and this is what you get. If you're lucky, you don't get anything else.